Judge rules B.R. Skelton GOP nominee

COLUMBIA - A Columbia judge ruled Tuesday that Rep. B.R. Skelton should remain the Republican nominee for a Clemson-area state House seat.

The decision all but concludes a legal battle between Skelton and Ed Harris, the man who won the Republican primary for the House District 3 race on June 12.

Harris' June win was rendered moot when the state party chairman, Chad Connelly, disqualified Harris' candidacy in early July because of a document missing from Harris' filing portfolio. Harris challenged Connelly's decision, arguing that the document had been presented properly — even though no one saved it.

Harris's claim against Connelly prompted Tuesday's hearing. That claim was folded inside a fraud lawsuit initially filed by Skelton, which alleged that Harris and Pickens County GOP Chairman Phillip Bowers had conspired to deceive state election officials when they said the filing documents were in order.

Connelly described Harris as a friend and said Tuesday that he had removed him reluctantly because the man's required statement of economic interest never could be located. To do otherwise, he said, would put the party in peril.

He said he never had reason not to believe Harris or Bowers but needed the document in hand because the party was facing a challenge in the South Carolina Supreme Court over the issue.

A May 3 state high court ruling said candidates must present a printout of their statement of economic interest when they meet with election officials. This stricter guideline, which belied state and party policies that said candidates only had to file online, resulted in more than 200 people getting booted off primary ballots in the weeks that followed.

Fifth Circuit Court Judge G. Thomas Cooper's decision Tuesday regarding Skelton's place on the November ballot came at 3 p.m. after more than four hours of testimony and 20 minutes of discussion in his chambers with five attorneys in the case.

At the start, Cooper said the case hinged on whether Connelly had the authority to disqualify Harris even after a June 21 unanimous vote by the party's statewide executive committee that asserted Harris had filed properly.

The June 21 vote by the executive committee came after Skelton challenged Harris' candidacy to the state party in the days following the Republican primary.

Harris said the judge, in the end, sided with Connelly on the question of his authority to qualify candidates for public office.

Cooper made no public statement about his ruling. Attorneys re-entering the courtroom walked straight to their clients and announced the news.

Harris picked up his briefcase and prepared to leave immediately.

Skelton shook hands with his attorney, James Smith, as well as Butch Bowers, the state GOP's general counsel.

Skelton declined to comment after the decision came out, but Smith called it a win "for the rule of law."

"We were vindicated for all the right reasons," Smith said.

Harris promised to continue fighting to represent District 3. He gathered enough signatures last month to appear on the ballot as a petition candidate.

"We will be there in November," he said.

Connelly said after the ruling that he hated to see Republicans divided over their nominees. He said the party on Tuesday had lawyers in courtrooms across the state — at considerable expense — dealing with lawsuits over candidate disqualifications.

"This has consumed my whole year," he said.

The timing of Cooper's ruling was critical because the state election commission required that political parties present the names of their nominees by noon Wednesday.

Cooper called the Tuesday morning hearing in response to a request from Harris' attorney, Stephen Brown, that the court block the state party from placing Skelton on the ballot in November's general election. Brown had further asked that the court place Harris' name on the ballot instead.

Cooper told attorneys in a temporary injunction hearing Friday that he would need a few days to read over documents in the case. Tuesday's follow-up hearing also gave attorneys time to subpoena witnesses in the case.

Among those testifying in court Tuesday were Connelly, Harris, Phillip Bowers, state GOP executive director Matt Moore, former House Rep. Rex Rice and Lexington County GOP Chairman Steve Isom.

Bowers alone was on the stand for more than two hours as lawyers for Harris and Skelton asked him about the day that Harris filed.

On March 20, he testified, Harris and Bowers met in the parking lot of the old Bi-Lo grocery store on U.S. 123 in Clemson. Bowers was on his lunch break from his job at the Oconee Nuclear Station. Bowers climbed into Harris' truck, where the would-be candidate showed the party chairman all his filing documents.

Among those was his statement of economic interest, Bowers said. The men set that document aside because, both testified Tuesday, state filing rules at the time indicated they didn't need to hold onto a hard copy.

That Harris showed Bowers the document wasn't enough, Smith said.

"At no time was there an attempt to file an SEI," Smith said. "It was just shown. He just said he saw it, and that fundamentally isn't adequate."

Smith had said Friday that he would have witnesses at Tuesday's hearing to testify Harris never showed Bowers his statement of economic interest. Bowers said no one else was near the truck when he met with the candidate, and Smith said Tuesday that he was unable to locate his witness, whom he never named.

"My position s that there was never such a witness," Brown said.

Harris, his attorney and their supporters have said that given the change in filing rules more than a month after candidate filing closed on March 30, the fact that Harris "presented" the form, in keeping with the high court's ruling, should have been enough to qualify him.

"It boiled down to Chad had the right to do what he did," Harris said.

Bowers disqualified six Pickens County candidates, including state Senate hopeful Rice, because they only filed online and didn't show him a printout the day they filed.